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Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Advent 1: get ready

12/1

The Soviet Union Isaiah statue

The first Sunday in Advent. Off to a bad start as I
have to clear Joe and company off the steps. It’s getting harder and harder to
get movement in the morning. George at least relocates to the bus stop for the
duration of services. I’m on the receiving end of attitude. And Joe’s wife
seems to moved to use the steps as a restroom before leaving. Enough already,
OK? And I struggle with my need to make the entrance open, clean and inviting
against the guilt trip accusations that come my way about neighborhood rich
people and their sensibilities. From my side, it’s respect I’m after. Beginning
with self.

Pat has come early with Larry to get the place
ready for Advent. Wreath. Greens. Candles. Other seasonal decorations. She has
a good eye and a caring touch. And as always I’m happy to see my son Dan here.

We start with singing Barbara Lundblad’s first
verse of a rewritten O Come o come
Immanuel.. seeking to avoid the supercessionism
of ransoming captive Israel.

O come, o come Immanuel

And bless each place your people dwell

Melt ev’ry weapon crafted for war

Bring peace upon the earth for evermore

Rejoice, rejoice! Take heart and do not fear,

God’s chosen one, Immanuel, draws near.

Our first lesson is ISAIAH 2:1-5

We talk about
how

t He shall judge between the nations,
and shall
arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat
their swords into plowshares, and
their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall
not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they
learn war any more

is the inspiration for the former Soviet Union’s gift to the United Nations, a statue depicting this
Isaiah passage. How strange that an
officially atheist country wouldchoose
a biblical image, regardless of how
universally appealing it is . Directly
across the street from the Isaiah plaza where so many antiwar protests take
place.

Ain’t gonna study war no more, ain’t gonna study war no
more…(Down by the River Side)

And we talk about swords to plowshares. Anna talks about
the city's gun buy back program. Someone else about landmines, Cambodian fields now stripped
of land mines and available for rice production the first time in a generation.
Buddhists turning bullets into bells.

Then we talk
about ROMANS 13:11-14. Leaving aside for the moment all the finger waving
admonitions, 13let us live honorably as in the day, not
in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in
quarreling and jealousy and instead focusing on the advice to put on the Lord Jesus Christ… asking ourselves exactly what
does that mean?

And I talk
about Ignacio Silone’s Bread and Wine, the story of a former seminarian now communist
underground resistance fighter hiding in the guise of a village priest. And how the townspeople begin to come to him for what should be expected from a priest. And to keep his cover, he
begins to do the work of a priest. And slowly, act by act, he comes to be a
priest, servant, even believer again. In Catholic existentialist terms, being
precedes belief.

And I recall
how as when I don’t believe, the simple act of praying with someone can make it
real again.

Finally, we
look at the Gospel. MATTHEW 24:36-44. Clearly about getting ready. We have to
deal with the way it has been appropriated the premillenial dispensationlists and
their rapture agenda. But the fact is, it’s not clear that it’s those who are
taken who are the blessed ones.

* It is
certainly clear that on World AIDS day, before we understood what was going on,
that was the case, that one will be taken and one will be
left.

* We talk
about our friend Diana who just died of lung cancer. During her days of capture
by the Argentine junta during the dirty war, that was the case, one taken, one
left.

Being taken
could be the judgment…

It’s about
keeping awake. Like my friend Father Earl helped St.Mary’s in Harlem become the
we are not afraid church, I would like West-Park to be the we are wide awake
church. Get ready.

And as
always, Marhsa wants to know for what? The end of time? And John R says that for
those who go on the Metro North this morning, it was the end of time.Six dead as a speeding train jumps the
tracks.A bad day for people get
ready, there’s a train a comin’.

People Get Ready

If it’s just
about the next world, Marsha isn't interested.And doing the right thingnow needs to be done because it is right of
its own nature, not because you’ll get punished if you don’t do it. We ponder
how we teach children:

You
better watch out

You
better not cry

Better
not pout

I'm
telling you why

Santa
Claus is coming to town

He's
making a list

And
checking it twice;

Gonna
find out Who's naughty and nice

Santa
Claus is coming to town

He sees you
when you're sleeping

He knows
when you're awake

He knows
if you've been bad or good

So be
good for goodness sake!

O! You
better watch out!

You
better not cry

Better
not pout

I'm
telling you why

Santa
Claus is coming to town

Santa
Claus is coming to town

Santa Claus is Comin to Town

That’s
not what living is all about…

Live today as if it were your
last. Just because.

Before our communion, we talk about World AIDS Day. And we talk about Stephen Festa. As he always saw himself as the
child inJesus’ arms and when he died, his partner rested the Tiffany widow and
rededicated it to Stpehen’s memory so that today we call it the Stephen window.

The Stephen window

We read the litany prepared by the Presbyterian Health Education and Welfare Association Aids Network litany. Light his candle. Recall others
we havelost. We prepare for communion. And
followingthe service, share in some classic brown and white cookies Gary
Greengrass has given us for the 4th day of Hanukkah.

Get ready for Christmas Day

We end the day with Paul Simon's get ready...

Later onway for a night of volunteer work at the shelter
at SPSA, I encounter Rachel. She’s been
released from the mental ward at St. Luke’s. But still been evicted from he
Capital Hall room. Now nowhere to go. And with a brand new shopping cart full
of accumulated items.It’s frustrating.

Late at night, I’m getting ready
to leave. RL, Joe and Pat stop in. Invite me up to the studio for an Amanda listening party. We sit quietly as her voice on CD fills the room. That Tin Man
song that led RL to call her Tin Girl. Almost as if she’s here with us.